Chapter 19: I, Lu, Am Just Too Soft-Hearted

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Chapter 19: I, Lu, Am Simply Too Softhearted

Have those two judge it?

That would be like hanging a lantern in a toilet—asking to die!

They both understood exactly what was going on with these two women.

First of all, their looks!

They had seen plenty of strange things in their time. Could anyone with an appearance that surpassed the limits of humanity really be human?

Besides, they had personally witnessed how their companions had died.

Some had suffocated after their breathing was reversed.

Others had been parasitized and died when the parasites underwent mitosis inside them.

Now both of them suspected that they had been parasitized too.

So what could they possibly say?

Offending either of these two monsters meant death!

Jing Tian racked his brains, trying to figure out how to speak without offending either side.

Although he was burly and rough-looking, becoming captain had never been based on strength alone.

He desperately winked at Akagi, signaling him to be careful as well.

But Akagi seemed not to notice. After pondering for a moment, he began his own performance.

“I think Miss Luo has won.”

His expression was extremely serious.

“When all is said and done, food is food. Its only useful quality is its taste. Every other value people attach to it is merely an additional so-called value imposed upon the food.

“If we look at it objectively, good ingredients do have their reasons for being good. So, judging purely by taste, Miss Luo is definitely the winner.”

Jing Tian stared at him, dumbfounded.

You’ve got some nerve!

How had he never noticed it before?

Did he not understand that the price of pretending to be objective was offending both sides?

Lu Li was somewhat surprised too.

How was this man so fearless?

On the surface, his words seemed to favor Miss Luo, but in reality, he had offended both women.

To begin with, he had directly dismissed the intentions behind both Miss Bai’s and Miss Luo’s dishes.

They had both said that their theme was “home,” and he had declared all of that meaningless.

Then he had said that Miss Luo’s cooking tasted better, which meant Miss Bai had already sentenced him to death.

The crucial point was that he had said the ingredients themselves were outstanding. Wasn’t that also a denial of Miss Luo’s cooking skill?

Lu Li watched everyone’s expressions carefully.

Jing Tian was as surprised as he was, which was no problem.

The important thing was the reaction of the two demon girls.

Hmm... They showed no reaction at all.

There was no doubt that Miss Bai’s gaze had fallen upon him.

Miss Luo was looking at him too.

In other words, neither of them had paid the slightest attention to Akagi’s words.

But Lu Li noticed something strange.

Akagi’s eyes were filled with terror.

He was anxious as well.

Yet the expression on his face remained perfectly calm. He continued speaking in a disjointed manner, appearing to favor Miss Luo without fully siding with her.

Then, in the very next moment, his head exploded.

Like a kernel of popcorn.

Red and white matter splattered all over Jing Tian.

Akagi collapsed to the floor. Everything above his lower jaw had vanished, leaving only his bottom row of teeth and his tongue, still twitching faintly.

Lu Li felt nothing.

Even he found it strange. Why was there not the slightest ripple in his heart at a scene like this?

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It was not that he felt absolutely nothing. Rather, he was a little helpless.

Helpless because his own floor had been dirtied, and cleaning it afterward would be troublesome.

Was Lu Li naturally a cold-blooded creature?

That couldn’t be.

But these people had to die.

Lu Li turned his head toward Jing Tian.

“Mr. Jing, please begin your judgment.”

Jing Tian looked at Lu Li, despair filling his eyes.

At that moment, he was like Guan Yu before Maicheng, Ma Su at Jieting, or Xiang Yu surrounded on all sides.

He could not say that heaven had abandoned him completely, but at the very least, it felt as though he had fallen into eternal ruin.

In that instant, every scene from his past in which he had teetered on the brink of death began to echo through his mind.

The helplessness he had felt when facing an invulnerable flying corpse in Bloodman Village.

The powerlessness he had experienced when confronted by the vengeful ghosts of an entire village in Short-Life Village.

The suffocating tension of facing the greatest swordsman beneath heaven at Sword Aura Manor.

And the hatred he had felt during the Imjin War, when confronting the undead ghost ninjas among the Japanese pirates.

This was the lantern of his life flashing before his eyes.

But Jing Tian keenly seized upon the opportunity.

He would search his past experiences—those times when he had been cornered yet managed to escape—for a way to break through his present predicament!

Then he discovered that none of it was of the slightest use.

This situation was entirely different from anything before.

His life or death depended merely on his evaluation of a meal.

The despair and helpless powerlessness of an ant facing a god who controlled its life and death was something he had never experienced before.

This was utterly absurd!

What kind of mission was this?

Survive in the hands of three monsters comparable to gods.

No wonder the mission had only one objective: survive for three days.

And yet, of the six people who had set out full of confidence, five had already died in less than two and a half days!

They had not even fought a battle!

But a world like this was the most terrifying of all.

Jing Tian wanted to live.

There were still things he had not finished. He still had his own obsessions.

So... he had to save himself!

After taking a deep breath, he came up with an idea.

“Actually, I couldn’t taste these dishes.”

He raised his head, his expression exceedingly earnest.

“But I could taste the emotions within them. Those overflowing feelings completely covered the food’s own flavor. Or rather, compared to those emotions, flavor itself was no longer important.”

Those dishes were filled with emotion.

Lu Li was somewhat surprised as well.

This fellow looked big and crude, but who would have thought he had such a silver tongue?

If you could talk, then say a little less.

The more you said, the more mistakes you made.

And he was clearly nervous to the point of collapse.

Lu Li could see his drenched back and trembling legs.

“However, those emotions were not directed at me, so I have no right to judge them.”

Jing Tian abruptly changed direction and turned toward Lu Li.

“So I’ll leave the final summary to the person who truly has the right to judge.”

Lu Li: “...”

You’re quite skilled at redirecting trouble toward someone else!

Yet for some reason, the instant his eyes met Jing Tian’s, Lu Li felt a little softhearted.

What kind of look was that?

Pleading, imploring, fearful, accompanied by an awkward smile.

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Lu Li had seen that look before, and he had seen it many times.

Back when he was still working at a company, he had seen similar expressions and eyes on the faces of many colleagues.

Usually on the faces of male colleagues in their thirties.

Men in their thirties or early forties who had married, had children, and still had a mortgage to pay every month.

He had seen those expressions when they met with their superiors, when they were pressured to resign, and after they had been reprimanded by their bosses.

Because they had families to worry about, even when slapped across the left cheek, they could only smile and offer up the right.

After being scolded by leaders younger than themselves, they still had to put on an air of indifference in front of everyone and say a few grand words as though nothing had happened.

The expressions and eyes on their faces had been exactly the same as Jing Tian’s now.

Their greatest hobby was fishing.

Their favorite saying was: “When I’m unhappy, I go fishing. When I go fishing, my wife gets unhappy. When my wife gets unhappy, I get unhappy. When I’m unhappy, I go fishing.”

Lu Li had quit and run away precisely because he could not stand that sort of thing.

Of course, it was not the fishing itself that he could not stand.

Now, seeing Jing Tian reveal the same expression and the same look in his eyes, Lu Li admitted that his heart had softened.

“You may go.”

Lu Li’s sudden words left Jing Tian unable to react for a moment.

Several seconds passed before he looked up in astonishment.

“What did you say?”

Had he heard incorrectly?

Was this monster actually planning to let him leave?

“I said you may go.”

Lu Li took out a cigarette and held it between his lips, then offered one to Jing Tian as well.

He took out a silver-chromed Zippo lighter and flipped it open. The flint scraped against the wheel, throwing off sparks that ignited the fuel-soaked wick.

A cluster of orange-yellow flame flickered, lighting the tip of the cigarette with a glowing red ember.

Slowly exhaling two streams of smoke through his nostrils, Lu Li said indifferently, “Live well. Try not to hurt too many people.”

Jing Tian stared blankly at him, then looked toward Bai Muli and Luo Qianning.

The two young women merely watched Lu Li with smiles. Neither of them even glanced at Jing Tian.

Jing Tian gritted his teeth, removed a ring from his finger, and held it out to Lu Li.

“This is the Mustard Seed Holds Mount Sumeru ring. Once you put it on and use your mind, you can retrieve things from within it. Everything inside is something I’ve collected. I hope it will be useful to you.”

Lu Li accepted the ring and set it aside without saying a word.

Jing Tian rose, bowed deeply to him, then lowered his head and hurriedly pushed open the door and left.

He had to leave this city! Then he had to survive tonight!

As soon as dawn came tomorrow... he would be able to leave!

Listening to his footsteps gradually fade outside, Lu Li sighed.

He felt a little self-mocking.

If he were in a novel, he probably could not become one of those protagonists who killed decisively without hesitation.

Forget it. Being an ordinary supporting character with a few minor flaws was not so bad either.

“It’s all right, Mr. Lu~~”

At some point, Miss Bai had sat down on his left. She even took hold of his hand.

“This is the Mr. Lu who belongs to me.”

[Sorry, Mr. Lu does not belong to you.]

Miss Luo sat down on Lu Li’s other side. Her mismatched eyes curved gently, filled with emotions Lu Li could not quite understand.

[The Mr. Lu who is so quick to soften, yet never soft-handed at crucial moments—that is the Mr. Lu I know.]

With two demon girls whose beauty surpassed the limits of humanity sitting on either side of him, the faint fragrance and subtle perfume lingering around his nose, Lu Li did not know what to say for a moment.

After a long while, one sentence finally escaped his lips.

“I think the dishes were indeed a little salty. And, of course, the seafood was a little fishy too.”

“...”

“...”

The smiles on Miss Bai’s and Miss Luo’s faces froze.

Thanks for the generous rewards from Glasses QWQ, I Am Not Jiang Chen, Call Me the Devil Lord, and Owl on the Resting Pine~

End of Chapter